This workshop will present and demonstrate creative interventions for problem solving with children in family therapy. Twenty Five years of working and teaching in this field taught me that in order to work well with children and help them one must be" Creative”.  By creative I mean: the courage and ability to think differently, to step out of models and expand contrived concepts of boundaries, to be able to quickly change sets of mind, to be inventive and innovative and to love to improvise and laugh while being serious. Successful work with children in family therapy necessitates understanding their "Head" and "Language'' and their appreciation for the paradoxical and the magical and working with them in the problem solving process. The use of multiple tactics and techniques is imperative. 

 

Using video clips and narratives I will illustrate pieces of work in family therapy with children of different ages with different problems like: anxiety and phobia, elective mutism, sibling rivalry and behavior problems in school.  We will see work with the utilization of the one-way-mirror with or without a team, creating family drama using paradoxical, strategic -experiential and narrative interventions.

 

I will also demonstrate the special technique of problem solving by using fairytale rules and “Mixing of the worlds” narratives to re-write problematic scripts and create experiences of solutions in family therapy with children.

 

Since these techniques work fast and they are all based on empowerment of children, on humor imagination and hope they are particularly relevant and effective in times of great stress such as in time of terrorism or natural disasters.